“We have been through that already,” I told him. “Good-bye.”
I heard a footfall as I left the room. Dara was beside me.
“What now?” I asked her.
“I thought I would walk with you, wherever you are going.”
“I am just going up the hall to get some supplies. Then I am heading for the stables.”
“I will go with you.”
“I am riding alone.”
“I could not accompany you, anyway. I still have to speak with your sisters.”
“They're included, huh?”
“Yes.”
We walked in silence for a time, then she said, “The whole business was not so cold-blooded as it seemed, Corwin.”
We entered the supply room.
“What business?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Oh. That. Well, good.”
“I like you. It could be more than that one day, if you feel anything.”
My pride handed me a snappy reply, but I bit it back. One learns a few things over the centuries. She had used me, true, but then it seemed she had not been entirely a free agent at the time. The worst that might be said, I suppose, was that Dad wanted me to want her. But I did not let my resentment on this interfere with what my own feelings really were, or could become.
So, “I like you, too,” I said, and I looked at her. She seemed as if she needed to be kissed just then, so I did.
“I had better get ready now.”
She smiled and squeezed my arm. Then she was gone. I decided not to examine my feelings just then. I got some things together.
I saddled Star and rode back up over the crest of Kolvir until I came to my tomb. Seated outside it, I smoked my pipe and watched the clouds. I felt I had had a very full day, and it was still early afternoon. Premonitions played tag in the grottoes of my mind, none of which I would have cared to take to lunch.
CHAPTER 3
Contact came suddenly as I sat drowsing. I was on my feet in an instant. It was Dad.
“Corwin, I have made my decisions and the time has come,” he said. “Bare your left arm.”
I did this, as his form continued to grow in substantiality, looking more and more regal the while, a strange sadness on his face, of a sort I had never seen there before.
He took hold of my arm with his left hand and drew his dagger with his right.
I watched as he cut my arm, then resheathed his blade. The blood came forth, and he cupped his left hand and caught it. He released my arm, covered his left hand with his right and drew away from me. Raising his hands to his face, he blew his breath into them and drew them quickly apart.
A crested red bird the size of a raven, its feathers all the color of my blood, stood on his hand, moved to his wrist, looked at me. Even its eyes were red, and there was a look of familiarity as it cocked its head and regarded me.
“He is Corwin, the one you must follow,” he told the bird. “Remember him.”
Then he transferred it to his left shoulder, from whence it continued to stare at me, making no effort to depart.
“You must go now, Corwin,” he said, “quickly. Mount your horse and ride south, passing into Shadow as soon as you can. Hellride. Get as far away from here as possible.”
“Where am I going, Father?” I asked him.
“To the Courts of Chaos. You know the way?”
“In theory. I have never ridden the distance.”
He nodded slowly.
“Then get moving,” he said. “I want you to create as great a time differential as you can between this place and yourself.”
“All right,” I said, “but I do not understand.”
“You will, when the time comes.”
“But there is an easier way,” I protested. “I can get there faster and with a lot less bother simply by getting in touch with Benedict with his Trump and having him take me through.”
“No good,” Dad said. “It will be necessary for you to take the longer route because you will be carrying something which will be conveyed to you along the way.”
“Conveyed? How?”
He reached up and stroked the red bird's feathers.
“By your friend here. He could not fly all the way to the Courts-not in time, that is.”
“What will he bring me?”
“The Jewel. I doubt that I will be able to effect the transfer myself when I have finished what I have to do with it. Its powers may be of some benefit to us in that place.”
“I see,” I said. “But I still need not ride the entire distance. I can Trump through after I receive it.”
“I fear not. Once I have done what must be done here, the Trumps will all become inoperative for a period of time.”
“Why?”
“Because the entire fabric of existence will be undergoing an alteration. Move now, damn it! Get on your horse and ride!”
I stood and stared a moment longer.
“Father, is there no other way?”
He simply shook his head and raised his hand. He began to fade.
“Good-bye.”
I turned and mounted. There was more to say, but it was too late. I turned Star toward the trail that would take me southward.
While Dad was able to play with the stuff of Shadow atop Kolvir, I had never been able to. I required a greater distance from Amber in order to work the shifts.
Still, knowing that it could be done, I felt that I ought to try. So, working my way southward across bare stone and down rocky passes where the wind howled, I sought to warp the fabric or being about me as I headed toward the trail that led to Garnath.
...A small clump of blue flowers as I rounded a stony shoulder.
I grew excited at this, for they were a modest part of my working. I continued to lay my will upon the world to come beyond each twisting of my way.
A shadow from a triangular stone, across my path... A shifting of the wind...
Some of the smaller ones were indeed working. A backward twist to the trail... A crevice... An ancient bird's nest, high on a rocky shelf... More of the blue flowers... Why not? A tree... Another...
I felt the power moving within me. I worked more changes.
A thought came to me then, concerning my newfound strength. It seemed possible that it might have been purely psychological reasons which had barred me from performing such manipulations earlier. Until very recently I had considered Amber herself the single, immutable reality from which all shadows took their form. Now I realized she was but first among shadows, and that the place where my father stood represented the higher reality. Therefore, while the proximity made it difficult it did not make it impossible to effect changes in this place. Yet, under other circumstances I would have saved my strength until I had reached a point where it was easier to shift things about.
Now, now though, the need for haste lay upon me. I would have to exert myself, to rush, to do my father's bidding.
By the time I reached the trail leading down the southern face of Kolvir, the character of the land had already changed. I looked upon a series of gentle slopes, rather than the steep descent which normally marked the way. I was already entering the shadowlands.
The black road still lay like a dark scar to my left as I headed downward, but the Garnath through which it had been cut was in slightly better shape than that which I knew so well. Its lines were softer, from flocks of greenery which lay somewhat nearer the dead swath. It was as though my curse upon the land were slightly mitigated. Illusion of feeling, of course, for this was no longer exactly my Amber. But, I am sorry for my part in this, I addressed everything mentally, half-prayer like. I ride now to try to undo it. Forgive me, O spirit of this place. My eyes moved in the direction of the Grove of the Unicorn, but it was too far to the west, masked by too many trees, for me even to glimpse that sacred glade.